Ch. 6: The Three Haunts
(Return to Arheled) He got up very early. The great thunderstorm yesterday—there’d even been hail—had ended the heat, and it was remarkably cool and dry and clear. Wind dappled the green trees with white. The lake, when he waded over by the Split Rock, was still gorgeously warm from the rain. He swam a little then got out: he didn’t really feel like getting wet much. Changing, he headed across the street and up to the Mountain; it was a woods day. He reached the top, out of breath but triumphant, and sat down on a rock. This time he witnessed Arheled appearing. Snow swirled together in the air and turned solid, and there he stood, in his brown pants with a green flannel shirt, leaning on a tree and squinting into the new sun. “Hi, Mr. Brown.” smiled Forest. “It is lovely weather at last.” Arheled answered. “Too muggy before this for anything serious, wonderful weather for bathing and pleasure but an ill time for work. And there is so much work to be done.” “I saw the Stone of Death.” said Forest. “Yes, I rather thought you might.” Arheled replied. “The Road runs stronger as the year advances and it’s return draws near.” “Why.” Why did the trees hate her, was what he wanted to say. Arheled looked off into the distance. Green trees shut them in and fenced them round. “When the year turns to high summer, the stars would descend to earth. But they could not come near the ground when they came, for the trees hated them. But into the water the trees could not come, and so at the turn of the summer the stars would come down to the lakes, and on the water they would dance.” “Here?” “The Long Lake was where they loved to come, and when the Road returned once every century it was a time of great merriment to them. There was a shadow in the trees and a darkness in the valleys, but the Lake stayed clean, and upon it they would dance. For the trees are creatures of the day and children of the Sun, and they wove a roof with their branches to shut out the host of heaven.” “The hills looked different.” said Forest. “The valleys were barely there, just ravines and gorges. Was it that long ago?” “Why do you say it must be long ago, Forest?” queried Arheled. “Granite is very hard.” “So it is now,” Arheled replied, “and therefore it is natural to assume it always was hard. So is sandstone hard, and one assumes it always was so; but how is rock formed, Forest, and how does stone come into being? Have geologists ever observed any stone but lava and cement in the act of formation, aside from the conditions they create in their laboratories?” “But granite would take millions of years to wear down this far.” “Yet you believe in the Protestant theories of a young earth, do you not? The earth, though not as young as they think, is far far younger than the scientists assume. They see the enduring stone of this land, and they presume it was thus forever; but granite is igneous, and schist is metamorphic; both were formed in the bending of the world, when stone was squeezed like dough and folded like clay up through the seam in the world to tie the earth together. Nor did it stiffen at once. For long generations the stone was soft and settling, and far more water coursed over it then, and wide valleys were eaten out. And then there were the wars of power, when the beings of old fought over this ancient chunk of land: the stone was shaped and shaken by forces scientists have no conception of.” “I thought they explained it by tectonic action.” “Tectonic?” Arheled laughed. “That only started at the Flood! What cracked the Earth into pieces, Forest, if Iluvatar cast it back and made it round? Did he make it cracked? Or did powers no longer present do battle on these hills?” “I do not know.” Forest said quietly. “Very good.” Arheled said gently. “If all men of science could admit as much, they would be wise at last. But when one has knowledge without understanding, how can one gain wisdom?” He fell silent, and when Forest looked up, Arheled was gone. The next day was just as dry and clear and cool. Forest got on his bike after surreptitiously studying his sister’s copied map. She’d been adding to it until the entire area around Winsted was shown, and he soon found a dotted patch far up a back road that was labelled Danbury Quarter Cemetary. This was likely to be the famous Green Lady Cemetary. After studying the roads he set off on his bike. It was already midafternoon; he’d gotten a late start. The ride was the longest and most tiring he had ever experienced. Up and up Boyd Street climbed, descending once to the Crystal Lake dam and once again to a queer pond, woods and houses dappled green in the cool wind. He came out on the open heights of Winchester Center and looked around to see Brooke’s house, but the trees concealed it. He turned right past the green and then reached the blue sign where the old Waterbury Turnpike branched off. Coach fares from hundreds of years ago were painted in white on the blue background. Forest headed down the old road. For the first quarter mile it was paved with white marble process, level and even, the green trees close above it. A farm of great age set deep in od fields and gardens, and a newer-looking house in the open, and then the road narrowed as Forest passed a sign saying '' No winter maintenance'', becoming more bumpy and woodsey. He descended a long hill and curved on to the north. The road crossed an open swamp. Forest came to a halt. The place was different from any he had yet seen. Something about it, the way the scattered short swamp maples stuck up from the dry yellowed reeds, the white-green fluttering of their leaves, the odd close-set twiggage of the clumped shrubbery, the tussocks and the deep mounds of sphagnum moss, the stark brightness of the staring sun…it felt queer and peculiar, strange and remote, as if he had crossed an unseen boundary into an overlaying world where things were half normal and half alien. “''Venda.” he murmered aloud. “This place is '' venda.” The road left the swamp after crossing a seeping waterway of broad sedgey pools stained a deep brown-red, peculiar hemlocks studded with new green and old green ringing it around. It climbed again, winding along the side of a long narrow valley. Through the dull brown forest of old hemlock, where all the green was high above, that dropped away on the left, he saw an open place. Overcome with curiosity he left the bike and headed down to the edge. Parting hemlock branches he stared out across a weird open mead, tall skeletons projecting here and there, low spike-like clumps of saplings and those queer bushes amid patches of reed, all carpeted with a deep wet rug of the strange moss. Here it grew so deep you sank above the ankle in it and water sloshed about your feet, twiggy stems piled over one another like a woven net, each year’s new growth growing on the dead mat of last year. A creek of dark water wound down the valley, and across the narrow open, a hundred yards away, tall pines and hemlock formed a wall of deep green. The sun, low in the west, stared down with a stark heat; and yet the air was clear and cool. It was not a canny place. A scrabbling noise sounded from above. Forest dodged and looked up, startled. Somebody was climbing down the tree. Forest got behind another tree. But when the climber jumped down he forgot about hiding, for it was Ronnie Wendy. “Hullo, Ronnie.” said Forest. “I thought it was you.” Ronnie greeted, smiling his odd wrinkled grin. “Saw you from the top. Are you looking for the Battle Mound, too?” “Arheled mentioned that at the Tower.” said Forest. “But I.” Was going to seek out the Skull and Cemetary. '' “Well, then let us journey together.” said Ronnie. He glanced at the sun. “Most likely be dark by the time I find the place.” he muttered. “What is Battle Mound?” “A mile or so north of the Center, according to the Bronsen annals, along the turnpike is a mound like a luge inverted bowl rising above a swampy meadow. There were two rival chiefs, Paugnut—or Nepaug—and the lofty Owleout. Nepaug tried to attack Owleout, but he discovered their coming and met them at the knoll. There in the starlight Nepaug was trapped on the island, the peat bogs on eary side, and Owleout pressed on up the knoll, tomahawking as he climbed, until the men of Nepaug lay dead and only a few escaped in the peat swamp, Nepaug among them. Overcome with gloom he travelled north and east to the gorge of Robertsville Falls. There the Mad and Still roar down a canyon and over teeth of stone and sudden whirling pools at the foot of eroded columns of soft rock. He sang his death song, buried his ax in a hemlock tree, and hurled headlong into the falls.” “Why is the knoll haunted?” Ronnie shrugged. “You can see how eerie the place is.” he replied. “The peat bogs are strange and uncanny spots to be in by day or night. There were all sorts of tales by night travellers of hearing war screams and seeing ghosts without their heads, even the towering form of Owleout with his bloody ax upon the hillcrest. Find it first, I say, and then say a prayer for the dead.” They made their way back to the road, where Ronnie had left his bike concealed by a laurel bush, and biked on down the road—at a crawl, for Ronnie was staring continuously into the swamp, trying to see any islanded clumps of trees that might mark higher ground. “What’s a peat bog?” said Forest. Ronnie came to a stop again, peering down at a gleam of water. Forest followed him as he abruptly dropped his bike and headed down to the swamp edge. “Spagnum forms mats.” he said absently. “Over ages, the dead matter builds up underneath, into a compacted turf which when dried out, burns. High acid in the water keeps it from decaying. I waded the swamp back there, when I thought I saw a mound; very little mire, peaty grainy mud in the creek bottom that quickly goes solid. The moss sinks but keeps you up. Water’s clean, too, enough to swim in.” They came to the edge of a broader expanse of water. A white-barked log reached out over it, and white bony stumps jutted from it. A beaver dam caused the pond, Forest saw, an old dam hidden under blueberry and those strange compact bushes. Foliage of maple and hemlock rose up like a cauliflowered wall on the pond’s near side, and the moss-mounded shrubs clustered across the meadow. “That’s why all the skeletons.” said Ronnie, pointing to the dam. “Raised the water level.” The light filled the valley in a most unsettling way; as if it was walled into the valley, walled light concealing something behind it. The day felt slanted, as if sliding steadily and undetectably downhill, descending, falling: despite the stark dry hotness of the sunlight, it had a ''late feel, and at the end of it was death. “Why is the water so dark?” said Forest. “Bog iron.” answered Ronnie. “Bacteria in peat bogs secrete iron, which piles up in nuggets. Main source of ore for Nrsemen. That, and being filtered through peat, makes it so opaque.” They went back up to the road, which now followed a ledge in the hillside under the green forest trees, level except for cup-like dry puddles, one lane wide. Then suddenly Ronnie peered off to the left, more intently than ever. “Holy cow, I believe that’s it!” he exclaimed, and they hid the bikes again and headed downhill. A dome-like hillock rose up at the very edge of the swamp. A scummy lagoon cut off most of the base from the hill. The dull brown hemlock forest ended at the neck, and the knoll, some twenty feet above the swamp and shaped like an inverted bowl, was open and green with short fern. Swamp maples stood here and there upon it, and thickets of blueberry and the nameless compact shrub fringed the base. An old hemlock with twisted branches grew at one end. It had a peaceful, repose-like air about it, with the fern and maples. “It doesn’t feel at all haunted.” said Forest. “No,” murmered Ronnie, “it doesn’t. Interesting. Well, at any rate,” making the Sign of the Cross, “may God grant eternal rest to all those who died here.” “Amen.” “See those close-knit shrubs growing everywhere?” Ronnie said. “Astilbe. At least they’re the spitting image thereof. A landscape plant with carrotlike flower clusters in the umbel pattern, pink and white. And here they’re growing wild. Wonder if they ever bloom?” The mound was maybe fifty feet long, so Forest and Ronnie soon had explored all of it and found nothing remarkable. “Now to look for that Cemetary—if we can make it by dark.” Ronnie said. “I know where the Blue Skull is.” said Forest. Ronnie listened intently as Forest related his dream. “That is very interesting.” he said. “I wonder why Arheled has us go seek it out. Well, let’s get moving, shall we?” as he began frantically swatting several brigades of killer mosquitos that had finally noticed their presence. Battle Mound fell behind. The road descended off the high ground and crossed a curious arm of swamp. Alder and maple fringed the road. The sun fell behind the hills and the valley grew shadowed. They passed the outlet of the peat swamp, where Rugg Brook spilled down over a stair of old stones and splashed on beside the road, dark red-black and foamy. Then they reached the Waymeet. The old turnpike crossed an ancient bridge of wooden beams worn and eroded with traffic. Another road came in on the left. The dark trees drew back and the waymeet was open to the sky. Foundations of forgotten buildings stood at the corners. It had a remote feel, as of a place at the back of the world. Ronnie went up the left-hand road. It immediately steepened, slabbing the side of the hill that bounded the Rugg Brook Valley. In the shadow of evening the trees seemed gloomier and grimmer than they were. The road forked at the top, one branch heading left and another, narrow and smooth, running on straight. “Preston Av.” said Ronnie, pointing left. “That’s not our way, though. They closed this for a while,” as they passed the remains of a chain-link gate, “because of the vandals, but I guess it’s been reopened.” The narrow road dipped down and plunged into a deep valley, crossing a second brook in a high fill. Then it ran on at a level for a long time, occasionally climbing. The hemlocks and maples closed in like green walls. They passed a firepit in a pleasant alcove among rocks and hemlock and then a few muddy turnaround places. After a mile or two they came to an open glade under high old maples where a triangle of dirt roads met on the left. Inside the triangle, was an immense fire-ring, piled stone sides a good yard high and the ashes a foot off the ground. A cellar pit lay behind, and above this the roads merged and ran on into the forest. And paving the sides of it were about five hundred beer bottles. “The Pit of Countless Cans, sure enough.” said Ronnie. “Let’s find the Skull first.” The logging road was so rutted and full of puddles they left their bikes and headed onwards afoot. It crossed a level region and climbed up onto a height, and at that point a smaller track branched right, following the crest of the narrowing ridge. Laurel and sparse hemlock stood around them. “Look.” said Forest. “There it is.” In the gloomy evening forest the round stone almost seemed to shine, a hundred yards into the trees on the right. It was pale, not exactly blue but a litcheny white-grey granite with a faint blue tinge. In the evening shadow the dents for eye socket and nose could be plainly seen. Fern grew green about it, for the logged forest had many open glades, and the Skull sat in one of them. “Let’s head back.” said Ronnie. “I want to reach the Cemetary before dark. Oh, do your folks know where you are?” “They all went to Lake Quassapaug and then the Pleasant Valley Drive-in.” said Forest. “I said I was sick.” “What, you can’t stand them already?” kidded Ronnie. Forest gave a half-smile. “I don’t like crowds.” “I find crowds rather exhilarating myself, especially crowds with a high percentage of attractive young dirlas.” Ronnie grinned. “But I’m never part of a crowd. I walk a lonely road…”'' '' '' “…And I walk alone.” murmered Forest. They reached their bikes and headed on down the road. It ran on for a long way further, as the evening grew quieter and sadder. They went up a small sudden hill and then began going down. The road plunged in a leftwards curve around a level open green area, and Ronnie put on the brakes, for it was the cemetery. Green Lady Cemetary was a relatively level lap of green mead, open but walled by high trees beyond its’ stone wall, maybe fifty yards across. A small pine grew in the middle. Ancient thin marble slabs graven with names tilted and leaned in uneven rows; many had been broken and the pieces carefully stacked back against the base. The turf was thick moss, mingled with grass and buttercup and creeping raspberry, and even the small clumps of wintergreen sprigs with their big red berries. Ronnie said you could eat them. There was a sad, remote, quiet feeling to the place, a sort of weary peace. It did not feel haunted, either. “The road grows worse and worse beyond the cemetery, until it turns into a driveway, from what I’ve heard.” said Ronnie. “I don’t think it’s graded much farther. This is the supposed grave of the Green Lady, here,” indicating a tall slab to the memory of Mary Croft, “but since the ghost stories only see a woman-shaped mist, and occasional green lights, I’m not sure how they arrived at that conclusion.” “Maybe she appears at that stone.” said Forest. “Or the stone’s occupant has a romantically sad story.” answered Ronnie. “Apparently Mary Croft was a Civil War widow who died of grief. Perfect material for ghost stories.” He made the sign of the cross. “Eternal rest grant unto our sister in Christ, Mary Croft, and to all buried here, may they rest in peace, amen.” “Amen.” said Forest. The light dimmed another notch. “It’s getting dark.” he added. “How will we get out?” “We’ll walk our bikes.” said Ronnie. “We’re not staying past darkfall.” It was very quiet here. Occasionally a car on the distant Danbury Quarter Road in the valley north of them could be heard, and the strange chirring of frogs from the swamps below them, and the faint whining drone of about ten mosquitos per square inch. Ronnie unpacked a blanket and wrapped it around both of them, even their heads. It helped. The evening steadily deepened. Under the eaves of the wood the shadow faded into gloom, and then darkness. Color drained, until everything was a faintly green dark-grey. The old stones gleamed pale in the open place. The sky overhead remained bright, white with a hint of violet, though it too began to dim. Shapes grew murky and hard to discern, like when you open your eyes underwater. A cool breeze stirred the blurry leaves, and Forest pulled the blanket closer. He saw the faint lights before Ronnie did. At first he thought they were lightning-bugs, but then he realized they were larger, and dimmer, and did not blink. Slowly a figure of misty green took shape, wavering as if battled by unseen winds, standing by the grave of Mary Croft. The eyes of Forest widened, for he knew her, despite her filmy aspect and featureless shape. Ronnie could see her too, for he struggled to his feet, and Forest got up as well. Neither of them felt fear; only a great, wrenching sadness. “The peace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.” said Ronnie. The phantom inclined her head. “I know you.” whispered Forest. “You’re the Star that was captured at the Blue Skull.” Still she regarded them from indistinct eyes, as if waiting for something. “We stand under the Road.” said Ronnie Wendy. “This I ask, in the name of Arheled: whose is your side?” And the Green Lady answered, in a voice so faint and wispy it seemed part of the night, '' “Against those who serve the Lord of Chaos.” '' Ronnie Wendy bowed deeply, and so did Forest, somehow feeling it right to do. But as they straightened up the Green Lady spoke again. '' “I am not free. The King of the Dead keeps me here. I may not stray beyond this yard.” '' “If the Road allows, you shall be freed, madam.” said Ronnie. “May Jesus grant you rest.” The Green Lady was already fading away, until all that remained was a brightness in the air, and then that too was gone. “Get your stuff.” said Ronnie, packing up the blanket. “We did what we have come for. Now we have to find our way out.” Neither of them said anything as they headed out of the graveyard and up the road. The granite process was pale in the dark gloom, and the road was plain enough before them. They walked, pushing their bikes. Now and again an animal rustled in the underbrush nearby, but neither of them were the kind who jump at shadows, and they filed slowly on. Trees seemed to slide past with amazing speed, as there was no distance to reveal how slow they were actually going. Gravel crunched under the tires. The air was almost cold, as nights are in early June, and Forest was glad he’d brought a sweater. As they passed the Place of Cans they saw a sickle moon rising above the ridge that concealed the Skull. Forest was glad they did not have to go up there, and at the same time felt a presentiment that sooner or later they would. Stars were coming out, faint in the dark-lilac sky. The gloom darkened, until the pale road was barely there and Forest found he could see it best by turning his head and letting his peripheral vision pick out the course. Fireflies blinked on and off, and so deep was the gloom that nearby ones actually caused a flicker of illumination below them, visible from the corners of the eye. Lights became visible up ahead. Red lights like eyes. “Taillights.” said Ronnie. “Someone’s parked up there to have a few beers.” That wasn’t much better than eyes. It was strange, Forest thought, but wild animals didn’t scare him half so much as other men. As they approached, walking slower, they saw a Chevy off-roader with the engine running, parked on the side facing into the woods, poisoning the forest with car headlights for about a mile in front of it. The dim jabber of rap music sounded from inside, and a couple guys were swigging away, oblivious of anything outside them. Like ghosts in the shadows the two Children of the Road slipped past, and began walking faster. Soon the eerie patch of lit forest was far behind and the comfortable silence of blurry dimness enclosed them again. A long time later the road began to fall steeply under their feet, even though the pale strip before them seemed level. The sound of falling water drew near as an invisible stream crossed under the road, and then they were at the roadmeet. Ronnie headed to the right. “I want to be clear of the forest before it gets pitch-black.” he said. This road, Preston Av, climbed so steeply both of them were out of breath at the top. A while and many turns later, they passed a house that stood ghostlike and dark in a dim yard. So far away from anywhere, it seemed unnatural for it to be there. “Houses begin here.” murmered Ronnie. “And the road is more open as well. We can ride; it’s much smoother where houses are.” It was a relief after the long walk to actually pedal. The road was still dim, although wider, and a stream of open purple sky ran between the trees above them, letting in a little starlight. The bright pricks of stars stood out in the misty grape-hued heaven. It was a little scary when downhills came and the bike accelerated down a dim road with unknown obstacles or curves, but Ronnie seemed to be unaffected and Forest followed him. It was almost like doing something with an older brother, this bizarre night ride. They came to an intersection where another ghostly road slanted in from the right, and the road bent left. Houses appeared here and there, some lit, many dark and lightless as if abandoned. The graveled road had some rather frightening downhills where brakes were necessary, but Forest was used by now to the faint dimness. Mile after mile passed in silence. A paved road slanted in from the right and they left the gravel behind. Fields opened out on the left. “Is the Herald up?” said Forest. “And where are we?” Ronnie pulled to a stop and glanced around. “There’s the Dipper, and Polaris,” he said, pointing left and behind, “but the Herald….must be under that pinky haze on the horizon. This time of year he never shows until really late at night. So we’re heading east by SE, which hopefully will take us to Winchester Center and Chapel St.” Progress was faster on the paved road. Now and then a farm showed up ahead like an island, a cloud of sudden sharp shapes clearly outlined in a garage light. Music came from one house. It was queer, passing by all these isles of life and home, individual worlds and circles of influence, as if he was seeing the world from behind or outside. Then they would fall away behind them and the night would close around. This far out there were no streetlights, a bizarre thing to Forest who was accustomed to well-illumined orange streets. “Arheled would like this.” he thought. A brilliant silver-white light like a rising moon shone up from around a curve, painting trees and limbs and leaves in brilliant detail of blue and stark green-white amid black. Brighter and brighter it grew, like a halo or corona, and then the blinding glare of a headlight took away all sense of the road. Forest shielded his eyes. Then the car was past and utter darkness fell around them. “I hate cars.” said Ronnie. Ahead a stark, lit island appeared amid the night: a town gazebo, floating like a ship in the enclosing blackness. They had reached Winchester Center. “I need to rest.” said Forest. Ronnie eyed him with some concern as they dismounted at the gazebo. Forest was quivering. “Are you weak?” Forest nodded. “When did you last eat? This morning? Noon? Oh dear. Let’s hope Brooke is home. You’re not tired; you’re having a sugar attack.” Forest barely wanted to get up. There was a quaky weakness in every limb. Ronnie helped him onto his bike and they glided down the green and up the driveway of the Pond house. Brooke’s car was there. Ronnie knocked on the door. A young man with a face as darkly gorgeous as some foreign god opened the door. He gave them a blank look. “Where the hell did you put Mart and Deli?” he said. “I thought they were ringing the bell.” “And who are you?” said Ronnie. Forest had instantly lowered his eyes, for he knew who this was. “Whaddaya mean, who am I? you’re the guy who’s knocking on the freakin’ door at 11:00.” “Ronnie,” said Forest suddenly and clearly, “keep him talking. Something’s wrong here.” He staggered down the hall. “I came to talk to Brooke, not some rude kid who won’t even give his name.” said Ronnie. “What are you, her brother or something?” “Brooke’s not available.” “Like hell she ain’t.” “Listen here, weirdo. You don’t go giving me this ‘tude. I can get you in trouble real fast. All kinds of trouble. Don’t you know who I am?” “Unless you’re Brooke’s father or brother, you’re just a stuffed-up spoiled ass.” “You’ll pay for that, dude. Boy will you pay. I’m Kevin, son of Cornello!” Forest made it to the kitchen and stopped with bulging eyes. Supper had evidently been interrupted very rudely. Food was thrown everywhere and some dishes were broken. Eating three brownies from a spilled pile helped restore some strength, and he hurried toward the living room. There Mr. Pond, red with rage, was lying on the sofa tied with duck tape, Mrs. Pond lying unconscious nearby. Forest didn’t stop, but hunted until he found stairs and then climbed up. He froze, with his head barely out of the stairwell. Delilah and Julian, dead drunk and high, were staggering around the room in a drunken imitation of dancing. The most awful thing in the room, however, was Brooke. She hung suspended in the air, arms spread like a cross, and floating like a ghost. Power seemed to be leaching out of her, like invisible liquid dripping from her. Forest pressed himself against the railing as somebody climbed up behind him and came out into the attic. It was a man he didn’t know, however, muscular and biker-like, a young bearded face with absolutely no features in his expression. “Will you two boobies go jiggle your a-- somewhere else?” he said off-handedly, and they giggled and staggered to a seat. He walked around Brooke, examining her. What he saw seemed to satisfy him. “The tests are just what we expected.” he muttered. “She affines with water, but does not know it. This is another of the Six.” From downstairs came a crash and boom, like falling bodies being slammed into walls. Then Ronnie’s voice, roaring some battle cry. Then another roar, also from Ronnie, but a roar of pain. Kevin came up the stairs. He was breathing heavily, and his arms had a ''scaled appearance about them somehow. In them he carried with ease a half-dead Ronmond Wendtho. Ronnie’s clothes were burnt and singed and his face and hands were blistering, and he seemed barely conscious as Kevin tossed him carelessly to the floor. “I don’t believe it, man!” he was saying. “We nabbed two of ‘em alive! In one night!” “Another of the Six?” “Drop dead positive, dude. Dead ringer for the picture. This one’ll be Ronmond Wendtho, who was formerly of Pleasant Valley. Won’t the old man be sore?” Forest crept slowly forward. His nerves were strung to a pitch. Picking up a baseball bat he swung at Kevin’s head like he was batting a home run. At the instant before impact, Kevin’s head shifted shape. For a flicker of time it was not a human head, but reptilian, monstrous, scaled with iron; and the bat splintered in half. Fire burst against Forest, burning like nothing he had ever felt. Screaming he dived for the stairs. They could not hear him, no more than they could see him, but Kevin knew that he was near. Fire jabbed into every corner of the room, but Forest was downstairs, scorched, reeling to a closet in which he crouched and hid. Footsteps sounded outside the closet. “I can’t see you, little fly, but I can smell you. I know who you are. You are the one we cannot see. You are Forest. And you are here within this room.” Cabinet doors opened and closed. Heat from probing flame reached Forest even in his closet. “Do you think dragons are blind, girlie-boy? Do you think we are as helpless as you, and that maybe you can bolt beneath my nose and break out your friends?” The door of the closet next to him was opening. “Ronmond is wounded. Brooke is prisoner by magic. You came on a bike; there are two outside. We are everywhere, child of the trees. We see everything. We are the law.” He opened the door of Forest’s closet, sudden and violent, and Forest, unprepared, found himself staring right into his eyes. His head was not human. Long, reptilian, with yellow, wise, sardonic eyes… “Look into my eyes, little Forest. As Brooke did, thinking she could kill me just by yelling. Look into my eyes, and fall under my spell.” Heat. Dull slow throbbing heat, prickling every inch of his skin; flushed heat, like when he got sunburn but worse, aching, stinging, burning. Eyes floating around him, gross and frightening and hollow with heat and sly triumph. Lances of cold piercing through it, silvery and whirling with the singing of the stars; and then suddenly all around him it was cold and keen, and the lake was like glass and the trees framed his vision as he stood upon the island. Upon the water the wheeling figures danced and flickered; but there was a queerness in their dances and an evil in their motions, though they were still beautiful it was a corrupted beauty, and a sickening gracefulness, and a mockery of everything that it should ought to be. But as Forest stared harder, he began to see them change; the stars flickered, the trees wavered as if something was trying to break through; and then a figure of blue fire pushed the swirling forms aside like grass, and the eyes of that figure were the eyes of Arheled, and he said, '' “Dragon.” '' Then Forest was caught up in the whirling, whirling of stars and of figures, a universe churning around him like a waterfall, and through the midst of it he heard the dragon mocking him, taunting him. “Everything is relative, and no point is fixed.” the fiery voice laughed. “Time can be calculated, and time can misapply; time can be twisted, for time is relative. You cannot know reality, for your senses are all you have to go by! Smite the wall, little Ronmond, and think that your hand bleeds; your senses tell you this is real, and real it is forsooth!” Even as the burning voice mocked, Forest saw faint outlines forming behind the madness, solid lines: the lines of the room in which he stood, while the phantoms roared and whirled ever more desperately; and then there was a tremendous thump like a huge joint clicking into place and he was standing in the upstairs room. Brooke hung limply from the unseen chains. Ronnie Wendy nearby groaned and sat up with a tremendous effort. Pain flamed in his eyes. “Dragons.” he said thickly. Neither of us can be dragon-spelled, thought Forest.'' He reveals and uncovers, and I see truly''. He collapsed to a squat. He felt completely drained and weak. “Forest?” Brooke’s voice was a whisper. “No. Not all of us. Please tell me not all of us.” “What happened, Brooke?” said Forest. “Kevin walked in.” she whispered. “I was furious at him for standing me up. I screamed and ranted. He looked at me…” “I tried to call to Arheled.” said Forest. “He won’t answer.” Brooke’s voice trailed off into incoherent murmers, and then she went limp. Without a sound the Wild Man of Winsted was standing in the room. “Wild!” Brooke croaked; a sudden blaze of love burned in her eyes. “You came to get us out!” “Not exactly.” the Wild Man said in his rough growl. “You called to me, little Brookling. When I am called upon, I come. What would you have me do?” “Free us.” whispered Brooke. “Heal us.” “What would you give me, if I did this for you?” “Anything.” Brooke moaned. “Just do it.” “''Brooke''…” croaked Ronnie. “Be still, little Hill.” sneered Wild. “The bargain is made. The pact is formed. I will rid your house of this infestation of baby pests.” Earth flowed over them, cold and wet and healing. It was bliss after the burns. The mud withdrew to reveal all injuries gone. Stretching out his hand the Wild Man of Winsted seized an invisible object and twisted. With a clatter like breaking metal Brooke fell into his arms. He set her down as feet pounded up the stairs. “Let me take you boys home, and then I will evict this firebaby.” he said. Suddenly the two boys felt stone around them, they were moving through unsolid stone, and then each one found himself, bike and all, outside his own house. Kevin crashed up the stairs. The bearded young man was on his heels. Julian and Delilah followed, the drunkenness gone as by magic. The four of them tumbled to a stop as they saw the one who opposed them. The rough bearded lips curled back in contempt. “So this is all that the Lord of Chaos sends against me? A baby dragon who thinks he is God, a doper who sold his soul and got cheated out of brains, and two little witches? Both of which are under my power?” As he spoke Delilah and Julian collapsed limply on the floor, tearing off their clothes, moaning like bitches in heat. Kevin threw them an alarmed glance before putting his hands on his hips. “I’ve heard of you.” he said. “You’re just an Elemental who’s forgotten his own place. All you are is earth and stone, ice and rain. But I—I am fire!” He shifted shape in a flash, until where he had been a small dragon stood, belching out a jet of flame so hot the room began to spontaneously combust. From the bearded magician curses flew, visible as if they were darts of shadow. The Wild Man spread his cloak. A hideous smile split his face. “Oh, I am so much more than that.” he said softly. Earth quenched the flames. A case of stone wrapped around dragon and magician, and vanished as Wild sent them away. “I call down the Road upon this house.” he said. A quiver went through the old building and all signs of the firefight and home invasion were erased. “There. All done, Brookling.” he said, almost jovially. At a flap of his hand Julian and Delilah put on their clothes and headed sulkily outside. “Now let me pronounce my price.” “Please…Wild…” Brooke said faintly. “You agreed to pay whatever I would name. Life and luck, laughter or love; dreams or memories, goods or thoughts, health or sight or limbs are mine. I will not take them. I will take from you this night your virginity alone.” “But…I don’t want…” His hands were upon her now, and she gasped with sudden passion. “I will make it the most wonderful night of your entire life.” he murmered. She could not answer. She was encased in a rapture that took away all will. Suddenly a blue flash of fire washed through her, and the passion vanished like a switch, even as her body met the wall with a violent impact and crunch of plaster. She sat down, dazed and a little sore, but sane. Arheled stood between her and the Wild Man of Winsted. He too was getting out of a dent in the wall, and he did not look very pleased. “Arheled, she is mine! She is under my power by her own bargain! You cannot intervene in her free will!” “Her free will?” mocked the Man in Brown. “Insane with torture and captivity and dragon-spell? You call that free? I’m surprised at you, Wild. You ought to know the rules by now!” “You cannot deny that she made a bargain!” “I do not deny it.” replied Arheled. “But she is one that I have called, and so I claim the right of a relative, to take what action a father or brother may take upon a seducer: a physical beating.” A slow savage smile grew upon the wild countenance of the other. “So, you would face me, my lord?” “In the shapes in which we stand and what strength is in those shapes, with physical prowess alone and unenhanced nor aided by our tremendous powers, we will settle the issue of the nullness of your claim. If I am bested, you may have your way with her; yet she shall no further enter under your power.” “To these terms do I agree!” laughed the Wild Man of Winsted. The house of Brooke vanished around them. An open field rolled away beneath them for half a mile in any direction. The air was cool and dewy, and overhead the stars lay dim and faint in the hazy mauve sky. Arheled and Wild lunged abruptly at each other. Brooke found herself chewing her nails. She knew nothing about boxing or wrestling, but given the nature of the two entities engaging in combat she expected a Jet-Li-style display of fantastic martial arts. Instead the two men whirled, ducked and swung in straight, simple boxing moves. Both were amazingly fast on their feet, despite the Wild Man’s great cloak, and as they swung and grappled back and forth neither seemed to be landing a telling blow; the other always dodged or parried it, using forearms like swords. Once Wild did land a blow on Arheled’s side, and another time Arheled got in a direct hit to the jaw. Wild reeled back, for he was earth formed into a body of flesh and could be hurt, and Arheled followed up, landing three more blows before Wild was recovered enough to dodge. Suddenly Wild stooped almost to the ground. Like a flash his arm snaked around the ankles of Arheled, pinning them against his side. In the same motion he straightened, using the leverage to catapult Arheled head-foremost over his shoulder. With incredible reflexes Arheled twisted in the air so he landed upright, dodging Wild’s vicious kick. While Wild was still in motion from this, leaping straight from the ground Arheled cannoned into his belly. The Wild Man bent double with an agonized grunt as Arheled bore him to the ground. The fists of the Warden rose and fell like sledgehammers. A sharp sickly thin tang crossed Brooke’s nostrils—blood!—and then Wild gave a kind of choked cry, and Arheled fell still, gasping for breath. “You may heal.” he said, recovering his wind all of a sudden. The Wild Man rose from the trampled hay-grass. His head had been smashed right in, leaving his skull a horrid dark mess on one side, but it regrew so swiftly Brooke could hardly believe she had even seen the injury. “Now answer, Wild Man, and answer me true: is your claim valid?” The Wild Man did not seem too much displeased, in fact satisfied. “My claim was voided in fair combat, body against body in strength of body alone. I renounce all right to woo the Child of the Streams.” “Then, Brooke, in the name of the Road do I clean you of the power Wild held over you. You shall remember, and you shall smile, but you shall not yearn.” A wonderful calm tranquility fell over her. She felt warm, filled with light, and delightfully content. “Thank you, Wild, for saving me.” she smiled. Going over she gave him a quick kiss on his rough lips. “I owe you that much, at least.” she said with a little laugh. The Wild Man of Winsted gave her a smile that was almost tender. “I accept your gift and cherish it, Streamgirl.” he said. “Well, I’d better be going. There are two plump little witches with nice tender breasts waiting for me near your house. Tonight’s wooing will be pleasureable indeed.” “Oh, and by the way,” said Arheled, “…neat move back there. Where’d you learn it?” Wild chortled. “Made it up myself!” he laughed. “Pretty good dodge you took me out with, though. Well, good night all!” “Bye!” Brooke waved, as Wild sank into the earth. “You could have stopped Kevin from even entering your house.” Arheled said abruptly to her. “Why did you do nothing?” “Brooke, taken off guard, stared appealingly at him. “He…looked at me…” “Your temper tantrum betrayed you to him. If your anger had followed its’ impulse, you would have had the power to oppose any number of fire-dragons.” His face grew grim. “As it is, the Road may exact a greater price for the bestowal of your power, for the dragon weakened your bond to it; I will try to lessen the price, but I may not succeed. Where there is desert, the Road is not easy to gainsay.” “Arheled, they know.” said Brooke. “They know who we are. They have found the Six.” “It would have been foolish to expect the Children of the Road to walk their normal lives and not be found.” responded Arheled. “But your house is under the Road, and neither dragons nor their servants can cross its’ doors unless invited in.” “Couldn’t you, like, do that to the whole state?” Arheled gave her a look as if she was nuts. “To sheathe each and every one of the thousand tiny realms and countless lands that intergrid the hills of this state; to cloak an entire town, let alone a county, so that the servants of dragons cannot enter? What do you think I am, a magician?” “What were Ronnie and Forest doing up here?” Brooke said, eager to change the subject. “I sent them.” answered Arheled. “They were searching out the Haunted Valley, the queer peat swamps of Rugg Brook.” “You mean the reservoir under Temple Fell? That is an odd sort of place, with the tall pines and all the laurel-moss jungles and that funny, reddish water. There’s an atmosphere about it.” “And well there should be,” said Arheled, “for that is the Red Valley and the Crimson Brook'', Grûg Dílick '' in the tongue of old. Rugg Brook is the name among men.” “Is it really haunted?” “It is, but not in the way that men think. Not in the manner of the ghost stories, but in a way far stranger than any can understand, save those few who still see truly. For that vale remembers from whence it once had come, and the strangeness of that land yet lingers in its’ transplanted condition, though none can see it save those who see. I did not call all of them. I called you from out of them.” “I don’t understand.” Arheled looked out into the distance. Brooke was aware, dimly, that the field without moving had somehow become at a great height, like a long sloping mountain. She saw the lands spread dimly around them, faint orange stars winking up from the dwellings of Men. “There are so few, so few who share the sight, the sense and the knowledge of the nature of Creation. Some of them are Catholics. Some of them know nothing of Catholics. One or two are even witches! Fools who hunt for the reality they sense, in all the wrong places, unknowing what they do. But all the rest, they are lost, they are sunk in the earth, their minds and eyes are stopped with muck. You’ve been in their schools, Brooke, and breathed the strange thick languidness of immorality that lies like a fog behind their minds; the casual careless lightness with which they drift into sex, tossing around their breasts as if they were basketballs. '' They don’t care. They don’t care.'' They drift loose without an anchor, and the dull blankness of despair lies behind everything they do.” “You mean that girl in biology last year who went all emo and got put on suicide watch?” “They hate Winsted. They don’t care, because they have nothing to stand under them. They hold no truck with religion—or as one said to me, they don’t f— with religion—but have a superstitious fascination with the occult. They try to exist in the moment, not thinking, not looking; drugging their minds with pot and beer and sex, lest they think too deep and uncover buried worms. It is all the same to them and the emptiness within them whether they get high or get hung. They laugh, emptily, and joke of butts and bosoms, their minds crass and frank but unable to rise higher than their own toilet seats. It is frightening to look upon.” “I know what you mean.” ruminated Brooke. “It’s like their brains are permanently located in their bottoms. Some of them are clever, intelligent kids, and yet when I listen to them, it’s like they let their minds go plop.” “Many fingers have been pointed as to why, but a finger can only point to one thing.” said Arheled. “And we are facing many things all melded into an atmosphere, a haze as it were, that lies over the world and can scarce be seen or felt. But those who see, they guess it is there, and those who were raised apart from it, the homeschoolers and the outlanders, they can see it clearest of all.” “That was an epic fight.” said Brooke. “But I wanted to know: why didn’t either of you use martial arts?” “Oh, like in the movies?” mocked Arheled. “You thought maybe we would use kara-te, or hang each other up with the Wushi Finger Hold? We do not like the East, Brooke, nor do we use their disciplines. Their fighting motions, like their mystic gestures, are steeped in and developed by the empty faiths of denial. To find your peace. To be at one with the All. To achieve harmony in your chi.” He shook himself as if shaking off fleas. “Those lands deny reality. I and Wild both assert it. We use nothing from a place that honors dragons as benign.” He lifted his hand out over the dark world. For a moment Brooke thought she saw a mighty causeway stepping on immense but thin and graceful arches out over the hills, but then it was gone as if faded out of sight. Above her head the stars shone strange and clustered, and it made her dizzy to look too long at them. “Why a fish?” she said. “The Fish is the sign of the Milky Way.” he answered. “In the ancient heavens there was no Milky Way, because there was no galaxy. But the path the Way was set to mark, that was there, though a memory even then; and still is there, despite the slow-swinging galaxies that cross over its’ path. And as they cross they turn aside, swinging along the plane of the way.” “Do you mean the Road?” “There are roads in the heavens, and roads on the earth. Does a road cease when its; imprint on the earth disappears? Most mortal roads do. But if a road is laid out on a bedrock of diverse natures, its’ imprint may last an unguessable time—as long as the earth itself, perhaps.” He looked down at Brooke with a smile. “But come. You are yourself mortal, and mortals need slumber, and you have endured much. Lie down now and take your rest, child of the streams.” Brooke felt an intense drowsiness overcoming her. She had just enough time to stumble over to her bed and flop down on it before sleep took her.